Ghazal Forcing the Man

— Hajjar Baban

to speak—for so long I grew to know only one.
I have one father. One shame. One house I inherited;

all the bad parts. Girl with no free country. Family
unwilling to be mapped. The page refuses my inheriting.

What does my God being one mean? I can’t promise to be left
religion but someone passed & did lie of inheriting

it. Drank & struggled their way to find a face eager to deal
with terror. I don’t ask to become my parent, or how to inherit.

Baban ​is a last name for someone without one—fake,
everything I touch hidden, shunned, waiting to reveal its inheritance.


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